Toronto live theatre for the week of May 21st, 2018. This week’s picks feature some very popular movies adapted to the stage, and plenty of choices for younger audiences! Our Editor Samantha is on hand with a few of her top picks in red. Check them out below the cut:
Continue reading Playlistings in Toronto for the week of May 21st
Scarborough Music Theatre’s production of Crazy For You dazzles Toronto audiencesIt’s no wonder that tickets for Crazy For You at the Scarborough Village Theatre have been selling like hotcakes. It’s a spectacular high-energy, tap-dancing blast!
Continue reading Review: Crazy For You (Scarborough Music Theatre)
Amsterdam is an ambitious new play that gets lost in its execution, on stage in TorontoAmsterdam, by Dan McPeake, presented by new company Wilde Bunbury Theatre and presented at the Red Sandcastle Theatre, is a 50-minute one-act play that speaks about the nature of time and its ability to shift identity, and the different personas we have at different times and for different people. It’s simultaneously linear and non-linear, asking us what it would be like if time merely ceased to exist. It’s a philosophical play by a young, developing playwright, and it shows. In the end, there’s an ambitious and interesting concept here that unfortunately doesn’t quite work in the execution.
Part 2 of this hilarious dramedy is “relatable”, and “nuanced”, at the Theatre Passe Muraille in TorontoThe Catelli’s are back in black, white and red in the second part of The Theatre Circuit‘s three-part made-for-the-stage dramedy series: Inch of Your Life. I had the pleasure of reviewing the “pilot episode” and have recently been blessed with a second pair of tickets to Episode 2/The Middle Part.
Continue reading Review: Inch of Your Life: Episode 2/The Middle Part (The Theatre Circuit)
After the Blackout is “powerful”, “vulnerable”, and “poignant”, on stage in TorontoRegardless of everything else that happens in the play, the ending is what makes the point.
After the Blackout, playing at the Young Centre for the Performing Arts, is not a typical theatrical story. I say that beyond the fact that the stories are all about people with disabilities, and played by actors with those disabilities. The note by Judith Thompson, who wrote and directed After the Blackout, talks about how the goal of the play was to write a complex story in which the disabilities of the cast were facts, not features. That succeeded beyond measure, but it too is not why this isn’t a typical theatrical production. This story is a-typical because it’s a difficult story, not just in what it is saying but in how it is being said.
Continue reading Review: After the Blackout (Soulpepper and RARE theatre company)
Mooney on Theatre is looking for folks to review shows at the Toronto Fringe Festival, which runs from July 4 – 15, 2018.
In many ways, Fringe Festivals embody what Mooney on Theatre holds dear: making theatre more accessible. The Fringe features inexpensive shows attended by a wide range of people, many of whom are not theatregoers the rest of the year.
With this in mind, we put an intense amount of effort into providing as much coverage of the Toronto Fringe Festival as we can. To get an idea of what that coverage looks like, check out the Fringe Festival category on this site.
Among other things, this coverage includes reviewing each show in a relatively substantive way by the end of the first weekend. This task takes a lot of writers. Each year, to make it happen, we bring on additional contributors. Maybe this year that will be you.
Continue reading Write for us! Coverage of the 2018 Toronto Fringe Festival
Live theatre shows in Toronto with ticket prices of $25 or less, playing the week of May 15th, 2018. Perfect for the budget-conscious theatre-goer. This week’s selections are sure to please with some amazing PWYC options, secret venues, and a festival inspired by young artists! Check them out below the cut:
Continue reading Cheap Theatre in Toronto the Week of May 15th, 2018
Toronto live theatre for the week of May 14th, 2018. This week’s picks feature a new festival, a true story, and a PWYC performance in a secret locale (plus so much more)! Our Managing Editor Wayne is on hand with a few of his top picks in red. Check them out below the cut:
Continue reading Playlistings in Toronto for the week of May 14th
August Wilson’s masterwork play hits all the right notes, now on stage in TorontoWhen you walk into the theatre for Soulpepper‘s adaptation of August Wilson’s Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom, you’re walking into a 1920s recording studio. This is apparent immediately, from the well-loved piano and old-fashioned microphones littering the stage, lying in wait to be used. While the space itself is relatively unassuming, the drama that takes place within is an elegant, well-acted, intricately crafted show that’s both entertaining and cerebral. Continue reading Review: Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom (Soulpepper)
Toronto’s Citadel + Compagnie presents a dance program inspired by Elvis and Johnny CashYou might think that a show entitled Elvis & The Man in Black was a music concert. But it’s not. It’s actually an evening of dance currently being performed by Citadel + Compagnie. The two pieces shown are each inspired by and set to the music of a legend of 20th century American music – Elvis Presley and Johnny Cash. Continue reading Review: Elvis & The Man in Black (Citadel + Compagnie)